Because she lost. 'She didn't play her best' is the excuse that fans use everytime their fave loses a match. True or not, it doesn't matter. Didn't play your best? Well, PLAY your best then. Nobody's stopping you.

Mean-spirited, hateful, bitter, cynical individuals loitering in GM who may also be fans of this or that player. All of this going on from bad to worse due to lack of proper moderating.

You observed very aptly in the 'miffedmax' thread in the Non-Tennis section, that a casual visitor to GM may get an impression that this forum is for people who love but rather hate tennis.

Because she lost. 'She didn't play her best' is the excuse that fans use everytime their fave loses a match. True or not, it doesn't matter. Didn't play your best? Well, PLAY your best then. Nobody's stopping you.

Except for the girl on the other side of the net perhaps.

Yes, but I seriously wonder why people post that sort of cheap excuse. In AO and IW finals, I don't think Sharapova played badly because it was a final or whatever, I think she has no clue how she should play against Azarenka given her (Pova's) skillset and Renka's playstyle.

Ironically, I'd say Agnieszka was playing badly for her standards against Azarenka in Doha and IW but I'd say she played rather badly in the prior matches despite winning them. Dubai was also not that good, it seems losing 0 and 2 was a wakeup call and she played her best tennis this year in Miami.
Still, Azarenka would have been probably out of reach even if Agnieszka had been playing her best tennis (maybe not in Sydney...). Hopefully she's using 3 weeks between Miami and Stuttgart to improve a little and be in great form for clay court season.

I don't understand why people insist it was a poor match from Sharapova.

Because she lost. 'She didn't play her best' is the excuse that fans use everytime their fave loses a match. True or not, it doesn't matter. Didn't play your best? Well, PLAY your best then. Nobody's stopping you.

I don't understand why people insist it was a poor match from Sharapova. I guess it was not good in the way that she didn't adapt to her opponent and didn't try anything different (netplay, loopy balls, whatever to throw Agnieszka offbalance), but her shotmaking and especially serve were really good by her standards. Anyone who saw her against Makarova should know how she plays on a bad day.

The thread at Talk Tennis at Tennis Warehouse with lots of interesting posts: even though the thread itself was started by some bitter Sharapova fan, the majority of responses are very favorable to Agnieszka, and give a much more representative picture about reception of Agnieszka's game by active tennis fans at large (several posters were at the Miami tournament by the way). A great read.

Sharapova fans mistook a quote from Matt Cronin as her own stating "I guess I never went back to Poland." They were freaking out about it and personally, even if it was her quote, I don't see the reason for getting upset over it.

I understand it must be frustrating to see a player you like not play their best tennis but sometimes people go out of hand. Some of the live commentary comments in the Live Commentary thread were also completely out of line and downright rude.

A thread at Talk Tennis at Tennis Warehouse with lots of interesting posts: even though the thread itself was started by some bitter Sharapova fan, the majority of responses are very favorable to Agnieszka, and give a much more representative picture about reception of Agnieszka's game by active tennis fans at large (several posters were at the Miami tournament by the way). A great read.

A very competent article by Richard Pagliaro of Racquet Reaction (tennis.com)

Quote:

Miami: Radwanska d. Bartoli 03/30/2012 - 12:21 AM

The moon over Miami was the lone source of constant light during tonight's strange semifinal saga. Agnieszka Radwanska pulled the plug on power merchant Marion Bartoli, 6-4, 6-2, in a wild ride to the Sony Ericsson Open final. This match featured a seven-minute injury time-out, a 17-minute power outage, and a steady stream of service breaks.

Radwanska broke Bartoli in all nine of her service games, winning 40 of the 55 points played on her opponent's serve. The seventh-seeded Bartoli stormed out to a 4-0 lead in snapping world No. 1 Victoria Azarenka's 26-match win streak last night, and picked up where she left off with a slick drop shot-lob combination to convert her fifth break point, capping an 18-point, nine-minute opening game to break.

It took six games and 36 minutes of play for the first hold. Radwanska dropped to her knees, absorbing the pace of a Bartoli blast, then slid a slice pass up the line for game point. When Bartoli scattered a return wide, Radwanska had the rare hold and a 4-3 advantage. Radwanska entered this match with a 6-0 career edge over the former Wimbledon finalist, effectively exploiting the limitations of Bartoli's reach by stretching her with angles. Radwanska is quicker around the court, plays well off power, and can change spins and speeds, denying Bartoli the pace she craves.

Showing her soft hands, Radwanska jerked Bartoli forward forward for a drop shot, then sent her scurrying back to the baseline for a lob, eventually breaking for the fourth straight time for a 5-3 lead. The game took a toll on the Frenchwoman. In between points, Bartoli bent over and clutched her left hip, paced in a stilted shuffle, and cast concerned glances at her father and coach, Dr. Walter Bartoli. Still, she played on, and when Radwanska sprayed a forehand down the line wide, Bartoli broke for 4-5, but wasn't exactly celebrating. She hobbled to the sideline, called for the trainer, and limped off for treatment of a strained left hip at the 53-minute mark.

Returning to the court with her left thigh taped, Bartoli looked to be in pain, but her lateral movement did not appear compromised. Radwanska, who suggested Azarenka exaggerated an ankle injury in her Doha victory over the Pole last month, greeted her opponent's return by breaking at love to seize the 62-minute first set—collecting her 13th straight set against Bartoli.

The second set followed a similar script, with Bartoli appearing on the verge of retiring a few times, only to stand her ground and continue to swing away. Radwanska broke at love for a 4-2 lead then the lights went out, literally, stopping play for 17 minutes. When play resumed, Radwanska ran off eight of the last 12 points, closing a two hour, two-minute soap opera on Bartoli's 35th error of the evening.

The first-time Miami finalist raised her 2012 record to 25-4, with all four losses coming to Azarenka. Radwanska will try to flip the script against second-seeded Maria Sharapova, who has won seven of eight meetings with the clever counter-puncher.

Will Agnieszka get a zero pointer for Charleston withdrawal? Supposedly on-site exception rule exempts you from paying fines, but it doesn't mention protection from point penalties?

This live ranking website updated Agnieszkas points to zero, but since it's unofficial they don't know if Agnieszka was commited to the tournament. Nonetheless, she withdrew after the main draw was out, so maybe she stil gets a zero?http://tenismaclari.com/agnieszka-ra.../Rankings.html

edit: I looked up the rules, she'll only get a 0 if she committed before the season. We'll find out next Monday I guess

A few most relevant excerpts from two articles by Steve Tignor (at «Racket Reaction»):

Quote:

If you prefer slam-bam tennis, you may not appreciate Radwanska's subtle skill set, but when she's on, she's one of the more entertaining players to watch. The Pole possesses shrewd court sense, exquisite touch, and is a highly-accurate player adept at taking the ball early and creating space for her shots.

this was a vintage Aga performance, no different from a hundred others. On the one hand, she hit very few winners, big serves, or memorable shots. On the other, she made very few errors, got everything back that she could put a racquet on, and changed speeds and spins and directions intelligently. Radwanska didn’t power the ball past Sharapova often, but she did enough with it to make her move, back her up, to keep her off-balance—to bamboozle her. And she saved her best tennis for when it mattered. Radwanska didn’t have a break point until 6-5 in the first set, when she broke to win it. And didn’t have any until 5-4 in the second, when she broke again, this time for the match.

(...)

For today, Radwanska’s win seals the unlikely rise of a finesse player in the Age of Power. She shows that the old virtues still apply, including, above everything else, playing within yourself. Aga knows who she is and what she can do. Mary Carillo and the rest of us are still finding out.

The women’s draw in Miami was worthy of a Grand Slam. So much so, it was the first time that every active Grand Slam winner had appeared in the same place at the same time since Wimbledon 2010. And that included every player on the WTA tour who had won this prestigious event before.

Venus Williams, absent since last year’s US Open with viral illness—and for most of the year before that—was a three-time Miami winner. Her sister Serena, missing for all but three months of 2011—and for the second half of 2010—had won five times.

Kim Clijsters, twice a winner in the Florida Keys, had been able to complete only four matches in 2011 after reaching the quarters in Miami last year. Svetlana Kuznetsova won in 2006 but had since struggled to find the form that took her to two Slams in years past.

The remaining Miami titlist was the defending champion and the newest member of the Grand Slam roll of honour, Victoria Azarenka. With two Sony Ericsson Open crowns already, she was the one to beat, defending not just the title but a 26-match unbeaten streak.

None of them made it past the quarter-finals. A new pair of hands would lift the trophy and they would belong, whichever of the two finalists triumphed, to one of the most popular women in tennis.

The first contender was three-time Grand Slam winner, the tall, elegant and formidably determined Maria Sharapova. She is the most followed female athlete on Facebook, the highest paid female tennis player and the sport’s enduring pin-up after 11 years on the pro tour—though she only turns 25 next month.

Three times Sharapova had been a finalist in Miami and three times a runner-up, including last year to Azarenka. And in both tournaments played this year, she had lost to Azarenka.

The other finalist had neither a Grand Slam to her name, nor was a previous No1, nor even a semi-finalist in Miami before, but 23-year-old Agnieszka Radwanska had one of the best win-loss records of recent months and reached a career-high No4 last week. She, too, had been beaten by only one woman this year: Azarenka—four times.

The slight, nimble and smart Radwanska, six inches shorter than her Miami opponent, was voted the Fans’ Favourite last season, and her varied, occasionally unorthodox, game of guile and touch is one of the reasons why.

The two of them, therefore—with Azarenka’s absence their common denominator—were aiming for a first Miami title.

Sharapova won the toss for her third match in a row and, for the third time, handed the serve to her opponent. On the previous two occasions, Sharapova broke straight away: This time she didn’t.

It was a canny choice, though. Much would come down to how each woman served: Radwanska’s second serve can be vulnerable, Sharapova’s serve in the past has veered between match-winning and match-losing but has of late become a bigger and more dependable weapon.

And much, too, would depend on the return of serve. Both, by nature, step in to take an early return—aggressive players despite their very different styles.

The Sharapova serve performed the better in the early stages: She held to love in the fourth and sixth games while Radwanska came under pressure in the fifth and the seventh to face a break point in each. However, the Pole withstood the bombardment, as she would for the entire match.

Come the ninth game and Radwanska took her first love service game, placing her serve with great accuracy—now wide, now to the body—and following up with ground strokes of varied spin and direction. Sharapova continued to take full-blooded swipes at them, but a few began to fire long.

Having put Radwanska in to serve first, it was Sharapova who had to serve to save the set at 5-6, and she failed to handle a string of returns fired back to her feet. She saved two of three break points but netted the third to concede the first set, 7-5.

But Sharapova is not a player to hold back. She had scored 16 winners and 25 unforced errors against a tactical Radwanska game that yielded few outright winners but few errors either.

The second set began rather as the first, with Radwanska serving and Sharapova in all-out attack. Radwanska withstood deuce to hold, but now there was a subtle shift in momentum as the Pole continued to hold her serve more comfortably—she held to love three times in the set—while Sharapova, though serving well, could not out-pace Radwanska.

The Russian’s frustration started to show—a sharp bang of the court with her racket as she fired one more in a growing tally of errors—but her solution was to hit the ball even harder. Sometimes it worked, but often it did not.

Sharapova earned a break chance in the seventh game but Radwanska, her serve performing just as reliably as Sharpova’s, made three perfectly-placed deliveries to hold. Indeed she lost only four points on her first serve in the set.

Sharapova’s first waver came as she served at 3-4, her first double fault taking her to 0-30, but she hurtled to the net to put away two winners and went on to hold. However, the stats showed who was in the ascendancy—who was channelling their focus the better: Radwanska had 70 points, the Russian 59.

The Pole stayed cool, returned everything Sharapova could throw at her, now with more slice than at any time in the match, and earned two break—and match—points. Another sliced return did the job and Radwanska took the biggest title of her career, 6-4. She had not dropped a set throughout the tournament, and looked the calmest person in Miami.

So Sharapova’s tilt at a 25th title will have to wait until her 41st final—but now she will hope to avoid not just Azarenka but the class act of Radwanska, too.

The Pole has brought a fresh way of winning to women’s tennis, and it will surely only add to her popularity.